'Why my husband dumped me on the night of our wedding'

I’m not proud of how my marriage ended but, in retrospect, we should never have married in the first place.

It was mostly a stressful relationship because Stephen had a lot of anger issues, mostly to do with him being an extreme ‘neat freak.’ He couldn’t handle anything as simple as a towel on the bathroom floor for more than 30 seconds; things like that would see him fly into a rage. He had the worst temper of any person I’ve ever met.

When we first got together, one of his workmates told me they were all scared of him. I should have taken that as a warning.

I guess you’d say it was an emotionally abusive relationship—he was always putting me down. But at the same time, we were very co-dependent. He needed me to idolise him, I needed him because I’d never been single before and couldn’t imagine what it’d be like to cope with life on my own.

'I’m not proud of how my marriage ended, but we should never have married in the first place.' (iStock)

The last time I was single was when I was 16. I’d had steady boyfriends ever since, and when I met Stephen when I was 26 he was my dream come true. He was wealthy, good-looking, came from a good family. He ticked all the boxes. I didn’t realise he had a horrendous temper until we went away for our very first holiday.

We went to Phuket and were involved in a minor motorcycle prang. I don’t even know whose fault it was; maybe it was our fault, but nothing prepared me for the tirade he threw at the young Thai driver. I thought he was going to kill him; he was threatening to ‘punch his lights out’. So that was an eye-opener for me.

The other thing I discovered was his drug use. He told me he’d been using cocaine on and off for a few years. I refused to do drugs because I’d seen too many friends ruin their lives.

Stephen promised he would end his 'party boy' lifestyle when he fell in love with me, and for the most part he kept his promise. I always knew when he was taking drugs again though, he became another person – the highs were bearable but the lows were dreadful.

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I broke up with him a few times, once when he didn’t come home for three days – he was on a cocaine bender. We split for a week then I took him back again, like an idiot. Another time he broke up with me because he had a jealous streak and said he didn’t like the way my cousin looked at me. My cousin!

I think Stephen constantly breaking up with me was an attention seeking thing. Another time he broke up with me because he said I wasn’t ‘putting out’ for him enough. He had an incredible sex drive, and if he didn’t have sex every night he would be very moody. Anyway, that time we were only split for three days or so, but it was constantly on and off.

Things were good for about two months, though, and that’s when he proposed.
I was really excited to be getting married and I wanted to start a family as soon as possible. But my friends and even Stephen’s sister told me I shouldn’t be marrying him because our relationship was so unstable. What’s the point of getting married if you follow the same pattern and break up two weeks later?

Of course, I didn’t listen to anybody. I wanted the dress and I wanted the fairytale, so we got married. The service was beautiful, the reception went really well – but once we got to the hotel room, he was drunk and clearly wanted to pick a fight, which was his usual routine.

'The following weeks were a nightmare of returning wedding gifts and explaining to people that we had made a mistake.' (iStock)

He accused me of flirting with my old boyfriend, who Stephen had already said I could invite and didn’t have a problem with him being at our wedding. It happened just as we were leaving—I gave my ex a big hug and we had a quick peck on the lips, which is something I do with several of my male friends.

We went back to our hotel and that’s where Stephen picked a fight. He told me I humiliated him, that he couldn’t trust me, he called me a ‘slut’ – it was awful. Then he left. I stayed the night in the hotel on my own, and when I woke up there was text from him saying ‘I am done.’ So that’s how my marriage ended.

When I saw him a few days later, he made a feeble apology and an attempt to patch things up but by then I'd had enough too. The following weeks were a nightmare of returning wedding gifts and explaining to people that we had made a mistake.